To Rebecca Boff, electronic cigarettes are a life-saver. Boff, 40, a former Rhode Island state social worker, is the proprietor of Ocean State Vapes, at 219 Putnam Pike, Johnston. She sells e-cigarettes.

Boff, 40, a former Rhode Island state social worker, is the proprietor of Ocean State Vapes, at 219 Putnam Pike, Johnston. She sells e-cigarettes and supplies and welcomes their users to grab a seat and “vape” in her store.

And Boff is a believer.

“I smoked for 25 years,” she recalled. “Vaping literally saved my life. I was so addicted, I would have kept smoking.”

Boff is in the vanguard of the e-cigarette boom, which is now an estimated $3-billion-a-year industry that has become a business and cultural phenomenon a half century after the U.S. surgeon general made history when he reported that smoking tobacco causes illness and death and he recommended that the government do something about it.